Iran moves closer to nuke weapons capacity

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VIENNA, (Austria), Sept 22 (AFP): Two years? One? Even less? Opinions differ on how close Iran may be to being able to develop a nuclear weapon, but concerned governments and experts agree the time to stop Tehran is growing short - and the options limited.
The time frame is increasingly important because of the possibility that Israel or the U.S. might opt for a military strike against the Islamic Republic if they judged that all diplomatic options to end its nuclear defiance have been exhausted.
And with Tehran showing no signs of giving up uranium enrichment or heeding other international demands, the diplomatic window is growing increasingly narrow. That fact gives special significance to a meeting of the 35-nation board of the International Atomic Energy Agency and its chief focus of what to do about Iran.
Hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appeared to stoke the flames Sunday, declaring that Iran's military will "break the hand" of anyone targeting his country's nuclear facilities.
He spoke during a military parade displaying various types of Iranian-made missiles. Also in the parade was a military truck carrying a huge banner saying "Israel should be eliminated from the universe" in both English and Farsi.
Iran insists its nuclear activities are geared only toward generating power. But Israel says the Islamic Republic could have enough nuclear material to make its first bomb within a year. The U.S. estimates Tehran's is still at least two years away from that stage.
At the low end is physicist and former U.N. nuclear inspector David Albright. He says Tehran could reach weapons capacity in as little as 6 months through uranium enrichment.
An IAEA report drawn up for the IAEA board meeting says that Tehran has increased the number of centrifuges used to process uranium to nearly 4,000 from 3,000 just a few months ago.
But Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security closely tracks suspect secret proliferators, has also been able to extrapolate other information from the report that is less obvious but of at least equal concern.
Iran, he says, has managed to iron out most of the bugs in the intensely complicated process of enrichment that often saw the centrifuges breaking down. The machines, he says "now appear to be running at approximately 85 percent of their stated target capacity, a significant increase over previous rates."